


One Prick And it’s Gone

by Fox_Salz



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Ambiguous/Open Ending, Dream Bubbles, Gen, Post-Canon, Sadstuck, Secret Santa, Social Isolation, because hey it's cronus, does ghost death count as needing a warning?, sexual innuendo, with a dollop of hope
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-28
Updated: 2018-12-28
Packaged: 2019-09-29 01:05:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,394
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17193584
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fox_Salz/pseuds/Fox_Salz
Summary: After the battle with Lord English, Cronus thinks and waits and worries and hopes.





	One Prick And it’s Gone

**Author's Note:**

> So I pinch hit for homestuckss and got cronusamporas on tumblr, and I am so glad because they wanted some Cronus. I was more than willing to deliver, and I hope you enjoy it!

Cronus was alone.

 

This wasn’t new to him, but just because something was familiar didn’t mean it was welcomed. Like an old jacket that was itchy, brushed his fins wrong, and suffocated him.

 

The dream bubbles used to be filled with ghosts, new ones popping in all the time. Death was a common occurrence in the game through all timelines. But then the bubbles weren’t linear, rather encompassing all of time or some shit like that so all the dead ever were always there. Maybe. Cronus really didn’t understand it and didn’t care too much. He was dead and that was what mattered.

 

Also what mattered was that the bubbles were different now. Fractured. Even lonelier.

 

After the big battle with Lord English—something else that mostly confused Cronus—everything had shattered into millions and billions of pieces, everyone who hadn’t been re-killed falling away from each other as the ground and sky opened up. He’d been next to a pair of Kankris and a Horuss, none of them his, when it happened. He’d yanked one Kankri back out of instinct as a fissure swallowed the other two and more ghosts besides. It was a futile effort. They fell backwards into a white void, Cronus losing his grip on Kankri's sweater.

 

It was pure chaos. It felt like everything was shaking even though he wasn’t touching anything. That whiteness was all encompassing, throwing all the ghosts around. One by one they all disappeared, flung or swallowed up to who knew where. When Cronus landed it was on a stretch of endless desert, just him and his guitar. He’d even lost his human cigarette during the whole Aranea mind controlling a ghost army fiasco. (And people called _him_ a douchefin.)

 

For a while Cronus wandered, seeing if anyone was around. He strummed idly to chase away the overbearing quiet. After a while of encountering no one he sang. At least with his own voice it was easier to pretend that being so alone wasn’t so unsettling.

 

Instead of a normal sky there were far off slivers of world twinkling all around in the whiteness. Sometimes he caught glimpses of figures he couldn’t make out and wondered who it was, if anyone. Fuck, might have just been some horrorterror that’d readily devour him. Either way it didn’t matter much; he had no way to get over to any of them. Didn’t mean it wasn’t unnerving.

 

More terrifying, though, was when they flickered out.

 

One minute a sliver would be there, then in a blink of an eye it was just white void. Cronus gulped, imagining what happened to whoever had been there. There was a single shred of hope left in his dead bloodpusher that told him maybe whatever was happening was good. Like they were all disappearing into some new world where everyone would be reunited and live in peace, like a real prize at the end of this whole shitshow.

 

If he had still been a naive wiggler listening to angels he’d believe that easier.

 

Sometimes he could still hear the angels whispering to him, telling him their prophecies. Cronus grew more bitter with every word. Towards them, his friends who had laughed when he told them about what the angels said, but mostly at himself. Why had he bothered sticking around the others in the bubbles? It wasn’t as though any of them ever ever liked him much, if at all.

 

Cronus had never really felt a part of the team so to speak. Not that any of them were ever cohesive together except maybe Meulin and Kurloz, and that was a whole other can of eels. He just never connected with anyone on a deeper level. Didn’t help that it never really seemed as though his friends ever actually enjoyed his presence. It was amazing how alone one could feel in a group of twelve.

 

So maybe Cronus wasn’t always the smoothest player, and every time he tried to reach out he got pushed away harder. If nothing else he was stubborn. Always had to keep trying. That was how he learned to play the guitar, and now the music he wrote was fucking spectacular if he did say so himself.

 

Cronus sat crossed legged where he was with his guitar propped in his lap. From this angle he could see several different land slivers. He watched them as he started strumming. Might as well work on one of his in-process songs since walking wasn’t getting him anywhere. Maybe “One Prick And it’s Gone”.

 

He liked to give a lot of his songs sexual titles even if they didn’t have anything to do with sex; sometimes it was symbolism and sometimes it was just sort of funny. Also it was a great placeholder because frankly titles were a difficult part of the creative process. Especially for something few people really paid attention to.

 

When he reached the second verse one of the slivers flashed away. His voice faltered but he kept singing.

 

It’d be nice to have an audience. The only one who ever really listened was Kankri, as long as he didn’t tell him any of the titles. Meenah was interested a few times before the whole blowing them up thing, too. But she always got bored easily. Or maybe just didn’t like spending time with Cronus. She called him a hypocrite which was several shades of hilarious coming from her. Called herself a troll of action then ran away from anything important.

 

Another dot of land petered out.

 

Cronus missed the angels. Missed being the bard of hope with a purpose, a prophecy about how he was important. He missed having hope.

 

He missed the assholes he called friends.

 

Two slivers disappeared this time, one right after the other without a second of reprieve. There was only one more that Cronus could see. He reached the last line he had down. It sort of petered out, a thought half finished.

 

A memory popped into his head, back before they’d entered the game. Music was his go to when he felt miserable, often putting his feelings into songs. Once Mituna had asked him what he was playing. There was no way he could give the truth, that’d only end up getting him mocked. Panicking, Cronus gave some bad pailing pun he couldn’t even remember anymore. It made Mituna laugh, though.

 

Cronus wished he’d listened more to Mituna’s doom prophecy. Was there a universe out there in paradox space where they won? The way everything was set up, how things had been purposefully stacked against them, Cronus doubted it was even possible. Their whole point in existing was to be a bunch of losers.

 

Cronus contemplated writing a ballad about it. “Paradox Space Is An Asshole, But At Least You Can Pail in the Bubbles”.

 

And then there were none.

 

His fingers fell from the strings as he stared at the spot the last sliver had been. It was just him now floating alone in the white void. Cronus had never felt quite this infinitesimal. Impressive, considering he’d died and spent eons in the dream bubbles, stumbling into dozens of billions of alternate versions of himself.

 

How much time before Cronus flickered out like the others? At least he’d find out one way or another what was happening. Either he’d see his friends again or he’d stop existing.

 

Which was worse?

 

Either way, as long as he was out of these damn bubbles Cronus would be happy. Hope bubbled up in him, little remnants stubbornly positive that things could only get better from here. It was possible.

 

Yeah, why not? Things hadn’t been so good for him up to this point so Cronus was due a little good luck. They’d just fought and defeated Lord English, after all! (Probably? Fuck it, _definitely_. Had to have that hope.)

 

Smiling to himself, Cronus ran fingers across his guitar and stared up at the empty whiteness. It was kind of magical, he thought, sitting there about to find out what happened next.

 

It wasn’t long until it was his turn. Cronus could actually see as his sliver of desert flickered. Him, too. It didn’t hurt, just sort of tingled in a way he’d never felt before.

 

As Cronus disappeared from the white void he was still grinning, long forgotten hope settling deep in his chest.

**Author's Note:**

> Idk if anyone will understand the innuendo or double meaning of the title. I'm okay with this.


End file.
